PPT Slide
Wisconsin requires no additional progress at all for schools that have more than 80% of their students reading proficiently. This defies the compromise struck by Congress in 1994 and described in Section IIA of this paper.
Other ways to mask lack of progress in proficiency rates. School A could also meet its CPI solely by decreasing the number of students who read at “minimal” level of competency (the lowest level possible) by three percent each year, even if the percentage of proficient or advanced students doesn’t change. This is because Wisconsin allows schools to mask failure to get any students to “proficient levels” if they move enough students from minimal to basic competency (still showing major flaws in reading abilities). This, too, could go on for years, adding generations of School A students to the travesty of non-readership in this nation.
Even worse for students in Middle School B and High School C. The situation in Middle School B and High School C is even worse. These schools start out with lower percentages of students reading at proficient or advanced levels; higher percentages of students not tested; and, in the case of the Middle School, a higher percentage of students who are only minimally competent in reading. One can imagine the multitude of ways in which these schools could continue to fail three-quarters or more of their students, and yet not enter the state’s school improvement system.
Allows for significant and continuous negative progress. Amazingly, these and other Wisconsin schools could also make negative progress toward students meeting standards, so long as increases in the percentage tested and students moved out of minimal categories are sufficient to compensate for the regression in proficiency rates. In other words, if High School C drops to 2% proficient or advanced (an 8 percentage point decrease) but “only” excludes 27% of its students from state assessments (a 12 percentage point decrease) it has met its 4% CPI, and Wisconsin will call it a school not in need of improvement!
* From the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Website, Commendably, this site contains a thorough School Performance Report for every school in the state. Though these schools were chosen to describe how poorly performing schools can continue to perform poorly without triggering any accountability, they represent the situation in a number of other schools, as well, and are not singled out as “the worst” schools in Wisconsin.
**Wisconsin requires no additional progress at all for schools that have more than 80% of their students reading proficiently. This defies the compromise struck by Congress in 1994 and described in Section IIA of this paper.